February 3, 2017

Still no explanation from state on letter about reimbursements

She had submitted reimbursement requests to the New Mexico Environment Department for a grant the village had received last year. But instead of depositing money into the village’s bank account, the agency sent a troubling letter.

In its letter, NMED said it would no longer accept invoices or requests for reimbursement for the grant.

According to a story in the Silver City Daily Press on Monday, that Jan. 24 letter from the state read in part:

As of the date of this correspondence, the NMED will not be accepting invoices or requests for reimbursement regarding your 2017 Recycling and Illegal Dumping (RAID) grant. This order is not specific to your grant, but is applicable to all RAID grants approved for 2017. The order is being made due to recent funding uncertainties related to the 2017 RAID grants. Invoices received after the date of this correspondence will not be paid at this time, and therefore should not be remitted. Invoices already submitted to NMED will be held and not processed until further notice.

Following publication of that news story, NMED did release funds into the village’s bank account.

But no one from the agency has explained to Hudman why it sent the letter in the first place.

Subscribe to our mailing list

“I’m not sure if it was due to legislative items or due to the Trump statement freezing all [EPA] grants,” Hudman told NM Political Report. “We did get paid, but we can’t get a hold of anyone there.”

That week, the Trump administration issued a temporary freeze on new EPA contracts. But that should not have affected an existing grant.

Last year, the village applied for and received a grant through NMED’s Recycling and Illegal Dumping (RAID) program. Those grants fund environmentally-sound reuse and recycling projects. Santa Clara was using the grant to finish installing crumb rubber—made from recycled tires—in its splash park.

Santa Clara’s annual budget is about $685,000. The total reimbursement from NMED was $231,000.

“I went into panic mode,” said Hudman when she heard the state wouldn’t reimburse the village. “I didn’t know: Do I lay everyone off, or would I have to call them all back in a week? But NMED wouldn’t respond.”

Reached by phone on Wednesday, NMED communications director Allison Scott Majure would not answer questions about RAID grants or the letter sent to the Village of Santa Clara.

When asked if her answer for the story was “no comment,” Majure said it was not and said that all questions needed to be sent via email.

NM Political Report sent a total of four email requests for information, before and after Majure’s request. Majure responded to none of those.

Related

More About

All week, we look for stories that help New Mexicans better understand what’s happening with water, climate, energy, landscapes and communities around the region. Thursday morning, that news goes out via email.

Ryan Zinke will step down from his post as Interior secretary, President Donald Trump announced Saturday. “Secretary of the Interior @RyanZinke will be leaving the Administration at the end of the year after having served for a period of almost two years,” Trump wrote in a tweet. In a second tweet, Trump said he plans to announce a replacement in the coming days. In a resignation letter obtained by the Associated Press, Zinke attributed his departure to “vicious and politically motivated attacks.”
Zinke, a former Montana congressman and Navy SEAL, oversaw much of the Trump administration’s energy dominance agenda, including the ramp up of public lands oil and gas leasing and the rollback of environmental protections.

There isn’t enough community interest in the cleanup of the massive Kirtland Air Force Base jet fuel spill to merit the creation of a Restoration Advisory Board. That’s according to a memo sent out by the U.S. Air Force this Monday.

All week, we look for stories that help New Mexicans better understand what’s happening with water, climate, energy, landscapes and communities around the region. Thursday morning, that news goes out via email.

This story is part of the State of Change project, produced in partnership with the Solutions Journalism Network. Dilapidated motels line the entrance to Grants, New Mexico, signs of the boom that came and went in this town of 9,000 people.

The state of New Mexico says the U.S. Air Force needs to immediately develop a plan to protect dairies from chemicals at Cannon Air Force Base. The New Mexico Environment Department announced today that Cannon Air Force Base near Clovis is violating the state’s Water Quality Act and related ground and surface water regulations.

Related Series

Join the Conversation on Twitter

Recent Posts

LORDSBURG, N.M. — Current and incoming Democratic members of Congress said Tuesday they had more questions than answers after touring U.S. Border Patrol facilities where a 7-year old Guatemalan girl was taken before dying earlier this month.